News

Farm Bureau is hosting a policy discussion on Thursday, March 1 at 7 p.m.

To participate in the discussion, farmer members will receive an automated call just prior to the discussion asking them if they’d like to participate. Once on the call, members will be able to hear the discussion, ask questions, and discuss topics of interest to them. Members will be able to participate using their phones and will not need to travel.

As our logo stares back at me from the computer screen, I can’t help but reflect on how these three words - Food, Farm, Family - came together in a most significant way last month. Farmers growing food, food feeding families. Seems simple enough.
It takes a way more circuitous route when you look at it through the eyes of Food Checkout Day’s School Food Drive. Food reaching families who are facing most challenging circumstances. The heroes of this story are too many to name, but I will take a moment to salute the schools and communities who rallied around this cause once again this year as part of our School Food Drive. Thank you.
Thank you also to the Ronald McDonald Charities® whose reach extends to 64 countries and regions throughout the world. Thank you to farmers who grow the food and to the schools who donated bag after bag, box after box of items.
And thank you to the farmers who reach families every day and not just in what we eat.
As o ...

Since 2010, Cook County Farm Bureau® has operated a Political Action Committee (PAC) designed to support candidates who are supportive of the policies, priorities and mission of the Farm Bureau while promoting the economic and social well-being of farmers and farm-related interests in Cook County.
Since being created, the PAC has made 34 endorsements. Not all incumbents. Not all challengers. Not all major party candidates. But candidates who Governance Committee members felt would make the largest impact on their District and the County.
Members of the Cook CFB PAC Committee are charged with making endorsements. When considering a candidate, members consider the results of the candidates’ interviews, questionnaires, support of Farm Bureau policies, and when applicable, voting record.
This Primary, alone, Committee members spent 34 hours interviewing candidates and determining endorsements. 34 happy, unpaid, volunteer hours.
Of the candidates running for ...

Downwind
by Bob Rohrer
“Just Text Me… Later”
In 2018, I will “celebrate” the nine-year anniversary of sending my very first text message. Cake, noisemakers, balloons, and games please… Yes, I was a late comer to this phone phenomenon that nearly everyone takes for granted today. Shockingly, I really have no desire to make up for lost time. Even my father, the Farmer, sends text messages nowadays...pigs now fly.
So, is the world a better place with texting? My children prefer text communication, so this is one way that I can “speak” with them. On the negative side, they may only respond when they get around to it or need something. It is harder to lecture through this medium…
The phone that I learned to text on was a flip phone (see pictured). I found the old phone in a file cabinet the other day… Remember when a smaller, sleeker phone was what it was all about?
You’ll remember that the process of sending a simple te ...

Did you know the Census of Agriculture data helps shape policy for American agriculture – from creating and funding farm programs to boosting services for communities and the agriculture? Respond now at www.agcounts.usda.gov.

Applications are now available for nurse practitioner scholarships through the Illinois Farm Bureau® Rural Nurse Practitioner Scholarship Program. There will be five scholarships, worth $4,000 each, granted this year.
The scholarship program, now in its twenty sixth year, helps encourage and develop the pool of rural health practitioners to help meet primary health care needs in rural Illinois. Students who receive scholarships agree to practice for two years in an approved rural area in Illinois.
To be eligible for the scholarship, students must be Illinois residents and be a Registered Nurse accepted or enrolled in an accredited Nurse Practitioner Program. Funding is provided by the Rural Illinois Medical Student Assistance Program.
Applications are available at county Farm Bureaus® throughout the state, on the Rural Illinois Medical Student Assistance Program website at RIMSAP.com, or by writing Donna Gallivan, Program Manager, Illinois Farm Bureau, PO Box 2901, Bloomington, IL ...

You may know this recently popular tune:
O Christmas tree, O Christmas tree
How dry and brittle are your branches
O Christmas tree, O Christmas tree
How dry and brittle are your branches
O once, you were such a lovely green
Fire resistant and so very clean
Now presents are gone and needles fall
How dry and brittle are your branches
Sure, I took some liberties with the words. Such a happy little song before Christmas becomes a little sadder after Christmas as that fresh tree becomes much less “fresh”. For those procrastinators out there, IT IS FEBRUARY on the calendar, and that means, it’s time to take the tree down!
It is always a bit sad when it becomes time for the “real” Christmas tree to come down. The green conifer “soldier” has fearlessly done its job of holding up the myriad of bright lights, sentimental decorations, keepsake items, kids’ mystery creations, expressions of the season, glitz and glamour…day after day, ...

I have a confession: I’m a “Potterhead.” Surprised? Maybe. But you should know that I’m an avid reader and not just of shoe magazines.
Since learning to read, I immersed myself in stories of Nancy Drew, The Boxcar Children, Goosebumps, Sweet Valley High, and The Saddle Club. Like legions of young girls before me, I imagined myself solving mysteries while riding trails by night on my trusty steed. As I got older, my reading preferences shifted from R. L. Stine to Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and Michael Crichton. On rare occasion - usually when I stole one from my grandma - I’d throw in a Harlequin romance novel. But I’m more of a dinosaur-kind of girl.
After college, my thrill-seeking tastes gave way to less Stephen King and more Kay Hooper, Iris Johansen, David Baldacci, and Karin Slaughter. My farmer calls them my “body count books” and he may have a point. But candidly, Stephen King started to scare me after I left the comfort of room ...

Smell the Roses
This month features the holiday that some love and some loath. Whatever way you look at it, Valentine’s Day is hard to avoid. It’s also a huge economic boom often bringing in over $18 billion according to the National Retail Federation. Approximately one-third of that total represents floral sales, which falls just below candy and cards.
Customs officials at airports begin working to make sure that the flowers a loved one receives contain only flowers! Customs and Border Protection (CBP) checks the millions of flowers coming into the U.S. for insects, diseases and even hidden narcotics.
Teachers who attend our Summer Ag Institutes are fascinated with the tour we receive at O’Hare Airport where we learn so much about the importance of Agriculture Customs and Border Patrol, a topic few Americans pay attention to unless they travel abroad. The majority of fresh flowers are imported - mainly from South America - and inspected a ...

Join the Chicago Ridge Library and Cook County Farm Bureau® for a candid discussion about how your food is grown and the decisions today’s farmers make. Speakers will provide an overview of modern farming practices, organic farming, and the use of genetically modified organisms (GMO). Speakers will also address audience members’ questions.
March 12, 2018
7:00 p.m.
Chicago Ridge Public Library
10400 S. Oxford Ave, Chicago Ridge
Speakers
Kim Morton, a former farm manager for the Northern Trust Company and farm owner, is one of Chicagoland’s premier speakers on GMO testing and use. In her role with the Northern Trust Company, she became the second woman in the nation to receive the “Accredited Farm Manager” designation and was a member of the Illinois Agricultural Leadership Class of 1998.
Morton is an active member of the Cook County Farm Bureau®.
Tim Stuenkel is the Global Marketing Communications Manager at TeeJet Technolo ...